Yes, you Reagan Democrats, this is the gift you brought to America: nothing! A generation of nothing, with nothing left, and nothing to build on. Just nothing. Well, you've left us with a lot of debt. And you also brought us the social movement that endangers reproductive freedom and the notion that non-partisan justices would sit on the Supreme Court. Nothing. The end-result of the Reagan "revolution." Nothing.
Every single one of you who works for a living and have votes Republican are responsible for this mess. I stand in judgment of you, knowing I was right and you are wrong.
Oh! But wait! I will bail you out! That's right! I have managed to live within my means, and can't afford a million dollar home in the inner-city because I refuse to sign the insane paper that has bankrupted our nation. So, you will keep your home and I will pay for it!
Nice work! I guess I really am the fool!
Well, all you Reagan Democrats, your fearless leader George W Bush (the perfect heir to the Reagan Dream) got on television last night and said that he would normally let bad businesses go bankrupt but that these are special times so he's going to bail them out with my money.
By the way: his successor is also going to stack the Supreme Court against you, eliminate funding for what's left of our infrastructure, and privatize anything he can!
There are some people out there not as angry as me and not as stupid as you who are trying to talk reason around this bailout. One of them is a Simon Johnson, the former chief economist at the International Monetary Fund and a professor at MIT. Professor Johnson wants stupid people (that would be any working person who supports the Republicans and any Democrat that voted for Reagan) to understand that there are alternatives to giving welfare to the poor starving billionaires on Wall Street.
Imagine!
Congress should consider alternative means of aligning incentives. For example, lawmakers could set a target for what return the fund is expected to get, and managers' compensation could be tied to their actual return relative to that target. Would-be fund managers should bid in an open process what target return they are willing to base their compensation on — the management company that is willing to accept the highest (or least negative) target for a set of assets would get the contract.Opinion: Who manages the bailout fund matters
In any case, the fund should provide full disclosure of the securities it buys, its valuation of them and the price paid. Its leaders should be open about overpaying relative to market price, and on that basis, the fund should receive preferred stock in any participating bank. This would give taxpayers some much-deserved potential upside.
That's right! We can demand preferred stock in the companies we are going to help! This is the Warren Buffett approach: invest, don't rescue.
So, we would purchase preferred shares in these companies, they would have an infusion of cash (which, by the way, is how capitalism works), they could stabilize and get back into the swing of business and profiteering. Then, when the companies are back on their feet, the fund would sell this now valuable preferred stock in the still-open and still-free market, and perhaps we could use some of those profits to pay down some of our debt.
Now, if you voted for Reagan I know you probably wouldn't understand something as fundamental as investment; but, believe me: this is a better idea than Barney Frank and George Bush have manufactured.
Any bailout of Wall Street is immoral. Any investment in Wall Street is questionable, but could potentially benefit everyone.
By the way, the billionaires on Wall Street oppose Professor Johnson's ideas, so you know they must be good ideas!
Next? John McCain will privatize Social Security and we can watch the Wall Street guys lose all of that, too! So, if you love this disaster, make sure you vote Republican again (because the black guy lacks experience) and watch the rest of our Treasury disappear.
1 comment:
You may be the only person reading this comment who has a full appreciation of the happiness the following news brings me, but this morning, at the breakfast table, my very conservative, allegedly capitalist husband announced that enough is enough and he is voting for Obama.
He is definitely a traditional Ohio conservative. He is a registered Republican. His father owns the manufacturing plant where he works as plant manager, and he is being groomed to inherit the CEO title.
Which made it all the more interesting to me (and a possible bellwether of good news in other households?) when he said this.
A little stunned, I asked him why. He said,
"Because enough is enough of this. I don't trust McCain because I think he takes his orders from his advisers, and I don't think he's going to do anything different unless it's even worse. I like Obama's tax policy for cutting the middle class' tax and putting the burden on the higher earners. As a prospective business owner, I don't like corporate tax, and I don't like capital gains tax, but I think Obama is trying to do the rational, right thing and that's what we need. His energy policies are sound, and his policies for social responsibility are in line with what you and I believe, and enough is enough. I'm voting for Obama."
Last election he voted for Kerry, but I think that was only in return for, err, special graces of this writer. This time he really means business, because he is disgusted with the status quo and willing to make compromises in order to facilitate change.
Let's hope he's not alone.
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